


conflict of interest

by chimaekjin (symmetrophobic)



Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: Emotional Constipation, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, and bratty hyunjin, it sounds so serious but it's mostly hyunsung paggro, office!AU, rating is for swearing bc i have learnt that not everyone is comfortable with that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-28
Updated: 2019-06-28
Packaged: 2020-05-28 12:49:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,145
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19394500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/symmetrophobic/pseuds/chimaekjin
Summary: “We haven’t broken up,” Hyunjin insists, before pausing. He doesn’t really have the balls to argue with Ryujin either. “Anyway,” he huffs, pointing at the picture on his phone. “Don’t you guys just think Woojin deserves better than some filthy rich little brat with a cute hairdo and some branded clothes, who probably throws himself at every hot guy he meets?”There’s a pregnant pause, as everyone’s gaze goes to the phone, then to Hyunjin.“I hate to break it to you,” Jisung says eagerly, like all he’s ever wanted to do in life is to break it to Hyunjin. “But-…”





	conflict of interest

**Author's Note:**

> hello beautiful people
> 
> why yes, yes i am procrastinating surrender and actus reus, how did you know,
> 
> SO this is a bit of a remake of one of my old league fics, my brain latched onto the concept and wouldn't stop yelling 2JIN until i wrote it so here it is guys i hope it brings some laughs!! office aus in general are Great Stuff and i felt like stayo3 has lots of angsty stuff as it is so it wouldn't hurt to have some nonsense on top of that too
> 
> ok yes please enjoy!!

When Hwang Hyunjin walks into the office that morning, Changbin’s already dumped a stack of files on his table.

This is nothing new. Changbin has been known to actively look for ways to make himself unlikeable in their bleak little office. He’s going out of his way this morning, though, Hyunjin would be touched if his mood wasn’t already sour.

 _By today,_ is scrawled on a cheap post-it in Changbin’s chicken-scratch handwriting. As per normal, then, Hyunjin yawns, shoving the files aside and setting off for some coffee.

In retrospect, he should’ve just taken the damn post-it seriously, for once.

He catwalks into their cramped pantry, mood improving slightly when Jeongin involuntarily shrinks towards the cupboards in an attempt to get away from him.

“What are you looking at?” He singsongs conversationally, pouring an excessive amount of sugar into his black ( _like my soul_ , he would say cryptically on good days) Americano.

He can literally _feel_ Jeongin weighing the pros and cons of ignoring him. Usually, this would make him feel empowered, but now, he just feels a little hollow.

Hyunjin doesn’t think about it, though. He’s very good at that. Chan once said it was the reason why he was so good at work. Little things like passing thoughts, nagging feelings, and potentially crippling internal emotional conflicts, he brushed off on a daily basis. No sweat.

Jeongin clears his throat, a prim _ahem_. “Nothing.”

To make himself feel better, Hyunjin shimmies his way right up next to the younger boy, propping himself expertly against their rickety pantry table. “Don’t ignore me, Jeongin-ah. It’s not polite.”

Jeongin vibrates with discomfort. “I need to go finish a report for Chan.”

“Boring,” Hyunjin nuzzles his way between Jeongin and his phone. “Is that Instagram? You have a _social life_ , Jeongin- _ie_ , I’m so proud-…”

Then he pauses. And he spits a bit of coffee onto Jeongin’s hand.

The following ten seconds consist of Jeongin swearing in that uniquely quiet but extremely threatening way of his, and Hyunjin continuing to cough into a paper napkin.

“Who is _that_ ,” Hyunjin finally demands once he has the breath.

“What?” Jeongin’s scrubbing at his white (now slightly brown) cuff in vain at the sink.

“That man in the photo!” The older boy gestures wildly, barely remembering to take precautions with his hair. His office stock of styling wax is running low, and it’s a whole ten-minute drive to his usual salon in town. “Who is he? You know him, right? Wait, let me see-…”

Jeongin wrestles his phone back from Hyunjin. “I don’t know,” he snaps. “Some guy from Advertising, maybe. Hyung, this shirt is _new_ -…”

“Advertising? They let someone with hair like his into _Advertising_?”

Jeongin squints at the photo. It’s a candid selfie of two men, taken beside a billiards table in the pub rec room a few blocks away, some people milling around the table in the background. “What’s wrong with his hair? My hair’s brown too-…”

“ _No_ , not _him_ , I know _him,_ for fuck’s sake _._ Who’s _that guy_ with him?”

Jeongin frowns. “What, you mean ‘Lixie hyung?”

Hyunjin successfully snatches the phone from him, clicking on the man’s profile and doing a brief rundown of his account. In about 0.34 seconds, he’s decided this _Felix_ guy is totally a fake model who bought all of his thousand or so followers and probably has a Patreon hidden somewhere. Come _on_ , the guy posts selfies with the Snapchat dog filter, he’s _clearly_ some fuckboy.

Jeongin grabs the phone back, and tries to sidle away rapidly with his coffee. Hyunjin stops him with a decisive arm.

“Who is _Lixie-hyung_?”

“Why does it matter?” The younger man sighs, like he’s regretting all his life choices. “He’s a friend of mine, we went to university together. He got transferred from PR to Advertising some time ago, he said-….”

“Okay, whatever,” Hyunjin says impatiently, brandishing the phone (still in Jeongin’s hand). “What matters is _why_ he’s standing so close to Woojin, looking at him with _that smile_ on his face?”

Jeongin is rather bruised, tired and slightly brown at this point, which is probably what pushes him to say something he’ll regret for the greater part of the next few months. “I dunno, his new boyfriend maybe?”

*

(“Why would you _say_ that?” Chan despairs later that afternoon when they’re in the pantry for their daily shittalk sessions, the subject of which today is Hyunjin.

“I didn’t _know_ ,” Jeongin responds defensively. “He never told me he had a _boyfriend_.”

“You can’t blame him,” Yeji deadpans, then. “I think I realised they were dating before Hyunjin did."

Changbin snorts a mouthful of coffee up his nose and has to clear his airways into the sink for ten minutes straight. Everyone except Chan ignores him.)

*

Hwang Hyunjin and Kim Woojin have not broken up.

Neither are they dating. They’re just…sort of in between, on the _out_ side, if you get what Hyunjin means. Taking a break, right, that’s it. A break that’d stretched from one week to two, two weeks to three, and is fast approaching a month.

Hyunjin’s not very good at saying sorry first. He’s not very good at saying sorry at all. It’s unfortunate that Woojin’s apparently chosen now to be bad at it too.

So what if Hyunjin had initiated the break? ( _Just_ break, not break _up_ , they’re two very different things, okay). So what if he runs away from the things he wants? It’s not _his_ responsibility to get them back together. Right? Right? _Right?_

And the more Hyunjin thinks about it, the more he runs away to stop thinking about it. So the days fly by, and the unidentifiable, nagging feeling that _might_ have been happiness slips further from his fingertips, buried under the megaphone of a bruised ego and a fragile hairdo. 

*

Hyunjin goes through three cups of coffee and all the files that morning.

“Damn, who pissed you off?” Jisung pipes up in interest as Hyunjin thunderclouds by his cubicle to use the photocopier. “Was it Jeongin?” _I always knew that kid was an MVP._

Hyunjin shoves the documents into the tray, before turning on Jisung, voice dangerously quiet.

“Who is _Felix_?”

If it’d been anyone else, they would’ve immediately seen the red flags go up and stopped right there.

However, this is Jisung. He immediately sees the red flags go up and proceeds on, full steam ahead.

“Cute boy in Advertising. Very popular and very gay. Good at what he does,” Jisung lists, taking full pleasure in seeing Hyunjin’s hackles rising with every sentence. “How’d he get on your nerves?”

“Nothing,” Hyunjin grits his teeth and slinks out with his papers.

For a minute, Jisung reclines in his seat with a satisfied sigh, hands behind his head, beaming at the wall as he carefully files this moment in his head, to be taken out and tearfully reminisced over in times of hardship.

This is going to be a _good_ week.

*

By end of the week, Hyunjin knows more about Felix than his mother probably does.

He’s the same age as Hyunjin. Outgoing and energetic, with a permanent smile on his face. Filthy rich, maybe even richer than Hyunjin is, if the weekend getaways to Bali and Perth (who takes a three-day trip to _Perth_? At least go to the Maldives, have some class) are anything to go by. Raised in Australia. Bleached his hair a month ago on a whim. A fan of Snow selfies. Transferred to Advertising officially because of manpower issues, but Hyunjin has a (very strong) nagging suspicion it’d been because of one of the tall boys with the cute smile that kept popping up in his selfies.

Hyunjin officially _hates_ him.

“It’s not because, you know, of his pictures with Woojin or anything, or how he keeps making those googly eyes at him, or how he keeps tagging him in all his Instagram stories and grabbing at his clothes like some dog,” he barks at a long suffering Jeongin, who’d lost a game of rock paper scissors when he joined the department and had to take the cubicle next to Hyunjin. “He just seems like a shitty person. I mean, no offence, if you guys are friends or anything-…”

“We are, actually-…”

“I mean, he just looks like the type to knife you in the back any day, you know what I’m saying? He has that face, you know-…”

“We roomed together for two years in uni,” Jeongin mumbles weakly in Felix’s defense, digging his grave further.

“Well that was a terrible judge of character,” Hyunjin steams. “He could’ve slit your throat and sold your kidneys at any moment! Look at him! Does _this_ look like the face of mercy to you?”

“Why,” Changbin says over a mug of coffee that’s somehow bigger than he is, on one of his rounds to breathe down people’s necks and make sure they’re working. “Are you waving around a picture of some guy in a dinosaur onesie?”

“That’s Felix!” Jisung contributes eagerly, knowing the beginnings of a dumpster fire when he sees one.

“We _do not mention his name_ ,” Hyunjin hisses.

“What?”

“He’s dating Woojin,” Yeji informs shortly, from the next cubicle (it’s a small office) (wait why is Yeji even in this conversation) (no, just because she’s his cousin and by blood rights enjoys pissing on everything he loves doesn’t count).

“Who?” Changbin repeats blankly.

“Hyunjin’s ex-boyfriend,” Ryujin deadpans from two cubicles away, clearly reclining in her seat to play Candy Crush. Changbin doesn’t say anything about it, probably because he doesn’t have the balls to.

“We _haven’t broken up_ ,” Hyunjin insists, before pausing. He doesn’t really have the balls to argue with Ryujin either. “Anyway,” he huffs, pointing at his phone. “Don’t you guys just think Woojin deserves better than some filthy rich little brat with a _cute hairdo_ and some branded clothes, who probably throws himself at every hot guy he meets?”

There’s a pregnant pause, as everyone’s gaze goes to the phone, then to Hyunjin.

“I hate to break it to you,” Jisung says eagerly, like all he’s ever wanted to do in life is to break it to Hyunjin. “But-…”

“Oh, thank fuck,” Changbin says bluntly, something having finally clicked for him. “Wait, Woojin broke up with you? I was wondering when he’d come to his senses. I mean, the dude didn’t strike me as a masochist or anything-…”

“ _Fuck_ you, hyung,” Hyunjin says sourly. “You know, just because the last time _you_ ever got kissed was probably from a spin the bottle game in high school-…”

Changbin doesn’t speak to him for the rest of the day. Frankly, this is a blessing.

Hyunjin spends his afternoon sunken in his revolving chair, morosely replaying a shaky Instagram story, watching the hand reach out and grab someone’s sleeve, heart clenching when the camera tilts up to a familiar smile, a little disbelieving and a little fond. He even plugs his earbuds in so he can turn up the volume to hear them laugh.

Life _sucks_.

*

This is not to say he’s jealous, though. Hyunjin would just like to make that clear.

His man pride is as fragile as his hair. It’d taken him six years of repressed feelings and confused jerk off sessions to realise he liked boys, like, _like_ -liked them, and wasn’t just clinging onto the arm of some Adonis every weekend to piss off his dad or get a good dicking. That’d taken a _lot_ of alcohol and a full-blown gay panic to handle. Oh, and Seungmin, of course.

And honestly, he’s not handling too well as it is.

His best friend stares him down wearily over a takeaway bowl of kimchi chicken stew and white rice, his head haloed in a ring of white from the ceiling light above them.

“Hyunjin,” he says in a clipped voice. “What happened.”

“Nothing,” Hyunjin manages to force out through a mouthful of rice. He gives himself a satisfied mental pat on the back.

Okay, his compact, minimalistic bachelor pad’s kind of in a mess, magazines and clothes strewn everywhere and sink full of unwashed dishes. And, okay _fine_ , Hyunjin had kind of passed out for the weekend and woke up realising blearily that he hadn’t consumed anything other than alcohol and prawn crisps for the past 24 hours, but things are honestly _fine_.

“You know,” Seungmin rubs his knuckles into his temple, the sleeves of his oversized knitted sweater falling back. “I thought this break was supposed to last a week.”

“It’s been a week,” Hyunjin inhales a quarter of the egg soup in the bowl that Seungmin had whipped up on the spot. He didn’t even know he _had_ eggs in his apartment. Seungmin’s the saving grace to Hyunjin’s shitty life – they’d grown up together, running in the same top 1% income bracket circles, except while the latter had had his expected wild child teenage rebellion phase the moment he’d turned 16, Seungmin hadn’t bothered. It’s like he’d looked at that part of the narrative, went “that’s nice” and carried on with life to casually get his law degree on a full scholarship in Korea’s top university. “Times four.”

“This doesn’t seem like your normal break-…breaks,” the other boy says carefully. Talking to Hyunjin when he’s in a mood like this is like playing Sudoku with landmines.

Hyunjin snorts into his soup. He coughs a bit.

“What did you guys fight over this time?”

“Don’t remember,” Hyunjin scrapes the bottom of his rice bowl. He drags the bowl of stew closer to him.

“Have you spoken at all since then?”

“Nope.”

“What’s different about it this time?”

Hyunjin grunts through a mouthful of chicken.

His best friend sighs. “Is this about that bleach blond boy who just joined his department.”

Hyunjin chokes on kimchi. Seungmin thumps his back automatically.

This makes Hyunjin feel about a million times better and a million times worse. Worse, because Seungmin knows and that means it’s _real_ , it means he’s not fucking delusional like he was hoping he’d been.

Better, because Seungmin knows, and Seungmin can fix everything.

“I can’t fix this for you,” Seungmin says firmly, like he’d read Hyunjin’s mind. The other boy slumps into the table. “Obviously, there are things here that neither of you have settled.”

“Then why isn’t he _calling_?” Hyunjin whines. He _almost_ stomps his foot, but catches himself just in time.

“Haven’t you realised,” Seungmin sounds tired. “Every time this happens, it’s _you_ calling for a break and _him_ having to get you back together?”

“Yeah, but-…”

“And haven’t you thought about what he might be feeling?”

“Sometimes it just-…”

“Haven’t you considered he might just be getting tired of this?”

Somewhere in the recesses of Hyunjin’s mind, the foundation of crippling insecurity holding up the rest of his being cracks a little.

Of course he’s considered it.

He thinks about it all the time, even if he doesn’t know it. He lives in that fear. It’s one house out of many in his head, full of old and familiar things, like dark rooms and a pleading, hushed voice, and empty scotch glasses and overfilled ashtrays on gold-lined glass coffee tables.

He tears happiness out of good things, as if daring them to keep giving it, because he doesn’t think anyone deserves to be happy. Even him.

 _Especially_ him.

Seungmin’s sidled around the table by this point. Hyunjin barely flinches when he wraps his arms around his head, fingers brushing reassuringly through his unwashed hair. He speaks quietly, the way Hyunjin’s mother used to.

“Of course he loves you.”

“How do you know?” Hyunjin asks, one hand wrapped in a fist around the fabric of Seungmin’s soft hoodie, staring at a vague spot on the wall across him.

Seungmin pats his cheek, but can’t reply.

*

Hyunjin does not die from malnutrition or disease from lack of hygiene over the weekend.

Seungmin manages to make the space liveable and has enough food in the fridge to sustain Hyunjin over the next day (he owes the guy his _life_ , honestly), and he shows up alive to the office with a lot on his mind.

Thankfully, his thinking face is about the same as his hungover face, and everyone stays out of his way in the morning. No one likes talking to Hyunjin when he’s hungover. There’s a 50% chance he’ll break your face, and a 100% chance he’ll break your sanity.

Kim Woojin is actually a very good boyfriend.

He listens to all of Hyunjin’s rants. He nurses Hyunjin’s bruised ego when Jisung decides to be more of a dick than usual. He buys dinner for him even when Hyunjin complains about how he doesn’t like the food. He doesn’t pick a fight when Hyunjin compares the older man to his long line of exes, and how he can’t buy him all the things they used to. He actually remembers anniversaries, and then does things on them, as if Hyunjin can be assed to care.

But he drifts. Like a balloon on a string, he floats where the wind takes him, quiet and gentle and drawing people to him like magnets, evil, greedy people who just want to take from him. And at the end of the string is Hyunjin, shoving the balloon away every time it drifts too close, just to make sure it _has_ to come back. And with every push, the string frays.

One day, the string’s going to snap.

Maybe it already has.

Hyunjin stares at the latest Instagram picture on Felix’s account – it’s Woojin, caught in mid-laugh, reaching up towards the phone as if to block the camera. His sleeves are folded back and tie loosened, and there’s a drink in his other hand, glowing amber in the weak evening light of the outdoor bar they’re at, with the rest of their colleagues from that department. He looks relaxed. Happy.

(Maybe it would be better if it did.)

Throat dry and hands shaking, Hyunjin loosens the steel trap in his chest, and the string slips from between its teeth, floating idly away.

*

A quiet misery saturates the office for the rest of the week.

Hyunjin sees Yeji throwing concerned looks at his booth when she passes by with coffee. Jeongin stops trying to avoid him in the office. Ryujin gives him a wide berth. Even Jisung is slightly less of an asshole.

“You okay?” Chan says over a mug of coffee on Thursday afternoon, after an extremely efficient meeting that had none of Hyunjin’s snark or Jisung’s screaming.

Hyunjin takes a sip of black caffeine. “Uhm. Yes.”

Chan watches him for a while. Then clears his throat, speaking kindly, like he’s handling a small, red-faced child with a history of temper tantrums.

“Maybe you should take tomorrow off,” he suggests. “Relax a bit. Have a drink and stuff. We’ll see you on Monday.”

*

This is partly how Hyunjin finds himself at a club that night, well on his way to getting hilariously drunk and broke from loneliness.

It’s a nice club. There’s a bar for losers like him and tall boys with nice shoulders and tight pants to look at, and the music isn’t actually all that bad. He likes this club.

His vision is swimming pleasantly, mixing with the music. There’s a certain joy in solitude that only comes with a lack of sobriety, and he turns down the girls that approach hopefully, the little gems at the corner of their eyes sparkling at the possibility of a free drink.

Hyunjin tips a healthy mix of whiskey and coke down his throat, staring into the dance floor, smiling absent-mindedly while his chest turns to stone. Woojin never liked clubs. He liked quiet pubs, places you could lean against someone and hear their heartbeat, or noraebangs, where you could just let go around people you loved.

He liked Hyunjin’s bachelor pad, lazing on the leather couch in front of variety show reruns at two in the morning, running his fingers through Hyunjin’s hair whenever the latter had had too much to drink.

He liked leaning down, pinning Hyunjin to the cushions with kisses that felt like velvet against the flush thundering under his skin.

Hyunjin had liked that too.

Now, he searches for it, staring aimlessly into the crowd of people searching for the same thing.

He stares and stares, and something flickers at the corner of his eye. Features start to swim into the sea of his consciousness, forming a comprehensive map, and a confused _hey_ , _I know that guy_.

Hyunjin sits up properly, and stares.

Felix’s laughter travels across the space between the bar and the dancefloor, even above the music – it’s a sound Hyunjin’s well familiar with thanks to the Instagram searching. His cheeks look flushed. He’s looking at someone. Dancing with them.

Between a mishmash of thoughts of _well fuck_ and _can my life get any worse_ , his feet getting tangled in the foot ring of the barstool and then almost spilling his drink, someone emerges from the crowd.

The guy, some rando Hyunjin's never seen before, is watching him, a stupid, starstruck look on his face. Hyunjin watches as Felix topples delicately into his arms, watches the guy’s hands curl around his thighs and pull the bleached blond boy close, grinding against his hips.

Hyunjin suddenly feels better.

And then he feels really, really terrible.

*

You (2.13am):  
_wy do u love himm lol_  
_he doesnt lov u back_

You (2.15am): _  
hyunggg_

You (2.19am): _  
whyyy_

Kim Woojin (2.32am):  
_Hyunjin?_  
_Are you drinking?_

You (2.33am):  
_hes bad_  
_he went home wih tht guyy_

Kim Woojin (2.33am): _  
Where are you? Are you alone?_

Kim Woojin (2.34am): _  
Hyunjin?_

You (2.36am):  
_whyd u stop loving me hyng_  
_lol_  
_im sory_

Kim Woojin (2.36am):  
_Hyunjin can you just tell me where you are? Please?_

You (2.38am):  
_u know I just_  
_want u to be hapy??_  
_lol_  
_b happy with me hyung_  
_pleas_

*

Hyunjin wakes up tasting vomit.

He pulls the blanket over his head, wondering if he’d crashed at the club last night. Then the bartender would call the last person he’d texted to pick him up, which in this case would probably be Jisung, whom he’d texted earlier to dump all his Friday work on, just because.

While the idea of fucking with Jisung is, on any day, a fine one, waking up half-dressed on his bed with the chance of Jisung’s murderous on-off boyfriend walking in at any moment is not a pleasant thought.

It’s such a _nice_ bed, though. Smells nice too. Like milk soap and green tea shampoo. Maybe he can risk the murder for now. It might be doing him a favour, anyway.

Then the bed sinks slightly beside him, and a reassuring weight rests on the blanket wrapped around his waist.

“Welcome back to the living.”

It’s Hyunjin’s mind that freezes over first. His body follows shortly, limb by limb. He remembers who uses milk soap and green tea shampoo now.

The blanket is peeled back gently, and the light, even through the curtains, hits his hangover like a sledgehammer. It’s like a near death experience, complete with shocking pain and beautiful angels.

Woojin watches him carefully, plush beige sweater like clouds against Hyunjin’s skin, features soft in the dim light. Hyunjin traces them with his eyes, from the hair falling into his face, the eternity somewhere in his eyes, to the tip of his perfect nose, and the weary, fond curve of his lips.

He looks _amazing_. And Hyunjin’s just _vaguely_ aware that he’s in a crumpled, probably stained dress shirt, grotty socks, hair sticking up in about 249 different directions and smelling of vomit.

This wasn’t exactly how he’d been fantasising their reunion would go.

“Fuck,” Hyunjin croaks, aware that his breath smells like something just crawled into his mouth and died. “Oh, fuck.”

Woojin laughs, the fucker. It’s the most beautiful thing Hyunjin’s heard in a month. Fingers run through his hair, gorgeous hands cradling the back of his head.

“If you’re going to throw up, let me help you to the bathroom first? Minho wasn’t very happy when you got his leather upholstery dirty last night.”

*

It takes Hyunjin about a marathon’s worth of effort, but he manages to shower and rinse out his mouth, and is bundled into a blanket on Woojin’s bed, curtains still drawn, staring meditatively at a bottle of water, a couple of painkillers and a bowl of warm oat cereal.

Woojin is a _gift_ from the celestial powers above to his shitty little life.

“So,” he says, now feeling relatively less pain and a lot more shame. “What. Uhm. What did I.”

Woojin gets the drift, saving Hyunjin from having to organise any more brain cells. “I got your texts. I borrowed Minho’s car and drove over to a few of your favourite bars until the bartender from the club called me.”

“Ah,” it’s starting to come back piece by piece to Hyunjin now, the drinking, the texting, what he’d seen last night. He throws back the painkillers to cover up. “So. Uhm. You-…you read my texts?”

“Hyunjin,” Woojin says, slightly long-suffering. “Who is _he_.”

Hyunjin chokes on a bit of water. “ _He_ ,” he says through loud intrusive coughs. “He. He,” this is the point he realises he’s going to have to actually confess all his internet stalking over the past few weeks. “He,” he mumbles. “That guy. Felix.”

Woojin is quiet for a while. Then he lets out a short bark of laughter. “ _Wait_ , Felix? _Felix_? You thought I was dating Felix?”

Hyunjin does not appreciate this being laughed at thing, and pouts into his cereal. “Yes,” he says, averting his eyes. “Aren’t you? Interested in him?”

“He’s a good friend,” Woojin smiles, after the laughter’s subsided. “Even if he didn’t sleep with a new guy every weekend, probably not.”

“But he’s so close to you,” Hyunjin mumbles a little louder, feeling quite stupid and very relieved now. “He always posts those pictures of you-…”

“And of everyone else. And so does Minho, and Lia, and Chaeryeong - even the bratty interns got in on it once Yuna started,” Woojin rolls his eyes slightly. “It’s a thing with the department. Just like how yours is full of anguished people who run on caffeine and refined sugar.”

“We _don’t_ -…okay maybe we do-…”

“Did you mean it?”

“Huh?”

Woojin’s the one who doesn’t seem quite at ease now. “Did you mean what you said? What you texted?”

Hyunjin swallows. He doesn’t exactly remember what he’d texted. He has a feeling he doesn’t want to, either.

“You said,” the other man seems to get this (again, a gift from above). “You wanted – us, to be,” he shrugs. “Happy together?”

It takes every fibre of Hyunjin’s being not to run out of the room right then and there, like how he’s run from every other moment like this, or deliberately killed it, for fear of truly wanting something he might not be able to have.

Instead he steels himself to sit and look into Woojin’s eyes. “Yeah?” It comes out almost like a question, first. He forces himself to say it again, like a promise. “Yeah.”

Woojin doesn’t say anything for a moment. When Hyunjin looks up, he looks stunned – also, a little concerned, as if wondering if Hyunjin had hit his head anywhere last night.

“You mean-…”

“Why didn’t you come back?” It’s Hyunjin’s turn to ask this time. His voice sounds smaller than he’d planned.

The weary smile returns to Woojin’s face momentarily. “Not like it’s ever worked before.”

“If-…I want _us_. To work,” Hyunjin blurts out, words tumbling over each other and shrivelling in shame from the contact. “Forever. If - if that’s okay-…”

“Yeah,” the smile on Woojin’s face brightens infinitesimally, lighting up his whole face in a wary, tender way that cuts deep into Hyunjin’s chest.

“I think I’d like that too.”

*

When he first meets Woojin’s department at the company mixer, Hyunjin does _not_ cling to his boyfriend like he’s a security blanket. Because he is a strong, independent young-…

“Hi!” A very familiar, slightly terrifying face greets Hyunjin, smiling brightly in the comfortably dim lights of the ballroom the company’s rented out. He hands Hyunjin a pint of Cass (at least he has good taste). “I’m Felix. Woojin’s told us all about you.”

Hyunjin accepts the pint, mouth dry. “Uh. Hi.”

He then proceeds to watch the blonde simultaneously throw himself into Woojin’s arms, one hand splayed against the older man’s broad chest, and hand him a drink. “Don’t be strangers! Minho really wants to meet Hyunjin again after he threw up in his car.”

Then he flutters away, leaning over near the buffet table to whisper something to a girl with cold eyes and a kittenish smile, who turns to glance at Hyunjin, before she giggles into a perfectly manicured hand.

An arm finds its way around his waist. “See? They love you.”

“That’s great,” Hyunjin says, sniffing his beer to check for traces of poison.

Then Woojin leans over, pressing a kiss on the side of Hyunjin’s lips. “Not as much as I do, though.”

That one makes Hyunjin flush from head to toe, pushing him and mumbling about _public_ and _everyone’s right there_ , and Woojin laughs, holding on tight.

*

Hyunjin Returns on Monday.

“No,” Jeongin moans quietly into the microwave, as Hyunjin sashays into the pantry. “Can you break up again please.”

“Tough luck, baby,” Hyunjin coos, propping himself up on the kitchen counter to grab his mug.

“If it’s anything like last time, you won’t have to wait long, Innie,” Changbin retorts, in typical Changbin fashion, draining his coffee mug.

Chan clucks his tongue disapprovingly at the second-in-charge, before shooting Hyunjin an encouraging look. “I’m glad the two of you figured it out. I hope you guys last long.”

Hyunjin’s just about to proclaim Chan as the only one in this office he wouldn’t sell to purgatory for a corn chip when Jisung storms in, pushing Changbin into the sink and punching himself out two rounds of black coffee, before thundering back out.

“What’s up with _him_ now,” Jeongin side-eyes him, as the microwave beeps.

“This is a _new_ fucking tie,” Changbin snaps, still coughing out coffee into the sink.

Hyunjin straightens up primly, legs crossed, grin spreading across his face like the Cheshire cat, with the smug air of someone about to deliver some cold, hard karma. “Seen Minho’s Instagram lately?”

Jeongin sips his warm milk pensively. “No.”

As the boss, Chan should feel worried. “Should we be worried?”

“Nope,” Hyunjin pops the “p”, taking a delicate sip of coffee with his pinkie sticking out, unflinching even as Jisung starts screaming at the photocopier next door. “But that cute dancer boy in Minho’s latest Insta post probably should.”

**Author's Note:**

> minsung uwu
> 
> 2jin is so!!!!! underrated and i hope there's more of it in the near future!! thank you for stopping by to read this ;u; i told myself to stay away from rarepairs until im comfortable writing the main pairs but i guess?? 3 fics in, here we are?? 
> 
> if you guys have more reqs from this universe/other rarepairs you'd like to see don't hesitate to drop it in the comments! i might be starting a woohan based on their 2kr vid if procrastination permits, and maybe some woochanlix stuff?? bUt oF cOurSe i should finish my chaptered fics first (i will get to that i swear)
> 
> kudos and comments are really super duper appreciated! your comments really give me the strength to Write On :""") hope you guys have a great day!!
> 
> p.s. hmu @symmetrophobic on twitter, let's be mutuals and talk cute skz stuff!!


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